Fun With Senior Projects

Always help the youngsters with senior projects.  While answering questions can make us feel like, "Oh, geez, how am I an expert on this?" go ahead and do it anyway.  Drawn books and cartooning are HARD work -- those of you who did it before the interwebs know what it was like to do it all alone, as The Only Nerd in the neighborhood.  Or the house.
As for what follows: Sometimes these things fall apart -- trying to get art done is HARD, even for professionals.  Especially for professionals like me, who have the procrastinator gene in about 75% of their cells.   I DID email back and told the student to tell their mentor to stop using the idiot term "graphic novel," which is almost as stupid as "Speculative Fiction" (No argue with me; it has since mutated into - put down your coffee -- "Imaginary Fiction").
Wonder if the hooked-up mentor is an in-house teacher they didn't have to pay extra?  Just sayin.'  And they really do need a class in bullwhip publishing -- as in, "You've got a deadline!  Get on the paper or get a bloody stripe down your back! Wa-chow!"
Anyway, so nothing goes to waste: What is your typical day like?D: Get up, do business (Hotmail, gmail, banking, bill-paying, marketing - PING, Twitter, Facebook). Fart around on Facebook a while, which often picks up customers. Researching and getting freelance newspaper stories and photos, doing art, layout, erranding, whatever needs to be done for the day. I try to get in walks on the beach (including picking up litter), or fishing; some kind of exercise. Work in the garden, yard, with chickens. In the summer, do house repairs, painting, etc. Always plenty to do. In the evening, while doing more art, like to watch videos (mostly police prodedurals and animation). What supplies do you need/use for your comics?DB: Traditional: Paper, dip pens, ink, brushes, sometimes technical pens, watercolor. Digital: scanning, tablet, GIMP coloring, OpenOffice for layout, MacBook for all processing and publishing layout (extra files dumped onto extra hard drive; MacBook upgraded to 4 GB).How long do you work each day?DB: From ten to twelve hours, on average.Does making comics alone pay the bills or do you also have to have a day job?DB: A little of everything. Artists have hundreds of employers over a lifetime. You have to run your own business.How long does it take to make one page? One full comic?jDB: In my case? 56 years (it's not a valid question without including training, research and length, size, processing, etc., of the drawn book), When did you start doing art related activities (drawing, coloring, art classes, etc.)?DB: 1954End of interview.  The student's email follows: 
This is an update on my senior project stuff, but it is also a thank you/apology letter as well. I have to thank you all for taking time to help me with my senior project. I have read all of the questionaires that you guys sent back to me, and I will use that information as a guide to help me in the future. Now here comes the apology part. The other part I was supposed to do was to sent 5 images to be critiqued so that I could redo them and get them critiqued agian. I was going to have them sent sooner, but here's why I havn't. first off it was trouble making the drawing in the first place. The first pictures that I had made before I startred this project I didn't really want to send because they weren't really that good, and they were almost the same (as in being drawn from the boring side view)  but when I tried to draw a new picture, I just couldn't get the the thing drawn. I know these alone are not a good excuse for the delay, but the next part is the true reason for why I may not send them at all. The biggest part of my senior project is my field of evidence, where I would work with a mentor through May 21-25 on the project. I have to accumulate 30-40 hours of work on this. While my project advisors definatly agreed that this electronic communciation thing may be a good experenice, it wouldn't count towards the field experience hours I need. My advisors have kindly hooked me up with someone who is currently my mentor on this. Now what I am doing is converting the novels thatI have started writing over the past 4 years into comics/graphic novels (the mentor is guiding me through this process like critiquing the script and synopsis, helping me with how a page should look etc) so thats currently what im focusing on now, but with both that and other school work to do, I don't really have time to do the drawings I meant to send (especally since I have to do some character illistrations in its place.) So I'm sorry I'm kindoff cutting out of the deal, but I got to keep up with the part of my project thats actually counted. I may or may not sent the drawings I promised just so I can get the feedback. Even though I'm probably not going to be working with you guys on this project anymore, if you still want to see the drawings, or if you just still want to work with me (which you probably wont given your busy schedules) just message me about it. thanksThe Little Store: http://donnabarr.blogspot.com/2007/04...